Pregnancy makes your brain shrink. Really, it’s a scientific fact. In 2002, researchers in London stuck healthy pregnant women and pregnant women with high blood pressure into MRI machines. The moms-to-be took a well-deserved nap while their brains were analyzed. Brains of healthy women shrunk during pregnancy until they delivered Junior, and brains of moms with high blood pressure shrunk even more. The good news is brain size returned to normal about 6 months postpartum.

I can totally relate to the brain shrinking part; however, I call bullshit on the return-to-normal part. My brain never returned to normal. My youngest is three-and-a-half, and I still forget things on a daily basis. It even prompted my mother to tell me I scare her. People try to explain it by saying, “Oh, it’s just lack of sleep/hormone overload/shifting priorities.” Whatever the cause, I’m pretty sure it’s a chronic disease. I submit the following evidence. These events are real, and have occurred over the last two weeks.

Every morning, I drop my 3 kids off at school. My son goes to an elementary school and my daughters go to a preschool. This means two drop offs. I was happily driving them to school, and I heard my son mutter, “Huh. Why are we here?” I looked around and realized I was at work. Shit. I calmly turned the car around and said, ”Oops! Mommy made a mistake. No problem; we will just go to school now.” My son said, “Well, Mom, at least you didn’t say shit.” Yep. He’s seven. Apparently I say shit aloud often enough that he knows it is associated with screwing up.

The next day I was intent on being a perfect carpool mom. I was super focused and prepared to drop the kids at school, on time, at the right schools. I turned into my son’s school, and my three-year-old said, “Huh. Why are we here?” Yep. My husband had taken my son to school that morning. My son was not in my car. I said, “Shit.” I will never live this one down.

Other examples:

1. I also forgot to take my son to baseball practice. My husband takes the blame here, because he is responsible for this after-school activity. But I can be a big girl and admit I forgot too. I didn’t tell him, of course. I shook my head and acted all disappointed in him. It was truly Oscar-worthy.

2. We forgot to go to church. Headed to hell for that one.

3. I washed my hair with conditioner. I have a shower routine that goes wash hair, slap on conditioner, wash face and other parts, rinse conditioner, maybe shave. I lost track of my routine and made a calculated guess that I was at the conditioner part. I was wrong. Now my hair is flat and greasy, and I don’t look like I took a shower. All that effort for nothing.

4. I forgot to buy tampons at the grocery store. They were the main reason I went to the store. On the bright side, I did get avocados, tissues, cheese, and organic garbanzo beans.

5. I didn’t exactly forget my husband’s birthday, but let’s just say there was some last minute shopping involved. He got a shoe shine kit, a new razor, Chapstick, and Advil. Because who can’t use Advil? And these items were at the same store as the garbanzo beans. You can understand how I got distracted and forgot the tampons.

6. I put orange juice in my cereal. I ate it anyway, because Africa.

My mind isn’t completely fried. There are plenty of things I do remember. For example, seeing Will Smith never fails to bring back this gem:

“Now this is a story all about how/ my life got flipped turned upside down/ and I’d like to take a minute just sit right there/ I’ll tell you how I became the prince of a town called Bel-air.”

This inevitably opens the flood gates, and I suddenly remember all the things. My inner songstress comes out, and this is what happens:

“Don’t worry be happy now/Muppet babies we make our dreams come true/Pump up the jam pump it up while your feet are stompin’/ Whatever happened to predictability. The milk man, the paper boy, evening T.V./Every rose has it’s thorn.”

Don’t judge. I’m eclectic. It’s endearing, not weird. And you are pleasantly surprised to recall the theme song from Fresh Prince. You’re welcome.

Oh, wait. One more:

“Please don’t go girl. You would ruin my whole world. Tell me you’ll stay. Never ever go away.”

Oh, Joey. My heart beats for you. Thank God you were spared in the battle against momnesia.